Readings for the Third Sunday of Advent.
St. Paul proclaims, “Rejoice in the Lord always! I shall say it again: rejoice!” surrender to God, according to the seventeenth-century French Jesuit mystic Jean-Pierre De Caussade, is a state of rejoicing in the Lord: “In this state of joyful self-surrender, the only rule is the present moment.” This is joy found in God alone, which then radiates to every part of our lives. But it is found in the purest self-abandonment in prayer, that is, a “general forgetfulness of everything…through the habit of letting drop our useless thoughts, so that…one may pass whole days without thinking…anything at all…which is called emptiness of the spirit…being in nothingness.” Self-abandonment is interior silence or non-thinking nothingness within. Caussade sings, “Heavenly purity! Blessed Emptying! Unreserved submission! Through these, God is welcomed into the very center of the heart!”
He pleads with us, “it will cost you no more than to do what you are doing, to suffer what you are suffering. It is only your heart that must be changed…holiness of the heart is a simple ‘Let it be,’ a simple conformity of the will with the will of God.” This “let it be” is wholehearted, welcoming, and joyful. This “let it be” delights in the Presence of God in the here and now and rejoices to do God’s will. Caussade assures us, “the more we learn to surrender ourselves to his all-adorable will at every moment, the more joy we have.”
Our surrender is joyful because we obtain the divine presence, which is all our hearts desire. De Caussade insists “every cross, every circumstance, every leading of the will of God, gives us God himself.” We surrender to God to receive the divine presence everywhere and in all the events of life. To delight in God here and now by doing God’s will is to celebrate the sacrament of the present moment.
This joy is facilitated by the flexibility of the sacrament of the present moment. Caussade recognizes how God's grace fits our lives to help us to grow in holiness. He does not believe God asks too much of us. While considering active faithfulness, Caussade says, “any duties it might impose are no longer duties when we do not have the power to fulfill them. If the state of your health does not permit you to attend church, you are not obliged to go.” Sickness overrules church attendance.
The practice of the sacrament of the present moment is practical because the circumstances do not matter, rather the “difference is in the heart. Beloved souls who read this! It will cost you no more than to do what you are doing, to suffer what you are suffering. It is only your heart that must be changed. When I say heart, I mean the will. Holiness, then, consists in willing all that God wills for us. Yes! holiness of the heart is a simple “Let it be,” a simple conformity of the will with the will of God.”
Even more, God is very careful to fit the divine action to our station in life, to our personality, and to the shape of a day for us. Regarding anything God wills for us, he says God “gives us the attraction of grace that makes them easier. He never urges any of us beyond our strength, nor in any way beyond our aptitude.” God does not ask the impossible of us.
Caussade tells us to do what we are already doing and to suffer what we are already suffering, but to do so in surrender to God. His counsel keeps us from being doormats, overextended, confined, or stuck. He says, “we should see God’s will accommodating itself to each individual soul, selecting the most suitable method of bringing about its union with him. Our duty is to submit.” This is our joy. Rejoice in the Lord!